Two Part: How much to Mix?

[ReefMadScientist]

Hello,

This may sound silly but I just ordered a Jebao DP-4. I will be using 1 gallon jugs for my Alk and Ca. How much Brightwell product would I add to each? Of course the dosing would be adjusted to find that sweet spot but curious on how many grams, etc. to use per container.

Thx.

Mike

And since everyone likes pictures.

 

[ReefMadScientist]

I just watched some BRS T.V. and they mix 2.5 cups of Calcium and 2 cups of Alkalinity in their gallon jugs.

I assume I will just follow this?

Thanks.

 

[ReefMadScientist]

Nobody uses Brightwell products for a 2 part?

 

[redfishbluefish]

Nobody uses Brightwell products for a 2 part?

Nope! Too costly for some fancy names for two simply ingredients. I'm a Dr. Randy Holmes Farley DIY two parter.


However, here's your answer on their "technical" page:

Brightwell Calcion-P
Brightwell Alkalin 8.3-P


Both require 5 teaspoons per every 8 ounces of RO/DI water. So for gallon jugs, since a gallon is 128 ounces, 5 tsp x 16 = 80 teaspoons. Converting teaspoons to cups, that is about (80/48) 1.67 cups of each to one gallon. Hope this helps.

 

[ReefMadScientist]

Nope! Too costly for some fancy names for two simply ingredients. I'm a Dr. Randy Holmes Farley DIY two parter.


However, here's your answer on their "technical" page:

Brightwell Calcion-P
Brightwell Alkalin 8.3-P


Both require 5 teaspoons per every 8 ounces of RO/DI water. So for gallon jugs, since a gallon is 128 ounces, 5 tsp x 16 = 80 teaspoons. Converting teaspoons to cups, that is about (80/48) 1.67 cups of each to one gallon. Hope this helps.

THANKS!!!

I would like to switch to something cheaper but scared the different brands will end up causing something bad. Of course, I am sure, they are all the same stuff anyways. I will look into Dr. Randy.

Thx!

 

[redfishbluefish]

HERE is Dr. Randy's formula write-up.


I'll simplify it:

ALK: 2 1/4 cups baking soda on a baking sheet cooked at 350 F (Randy says 300, but 350 works better and no negative impact) for one hour. Let cool and add to one gallon container and add RO/DI water to the one gallon mark. FYI, chemically, you are converting sodium bicarbonate to sodium carbonate. Here I have two batches ready to be baked:

CALC: I use Prestone Driveway Heat ice melt. Dow Flakes is very difficult to find and this Prestone product is very common in the northeast during the winter months. And FYI, I've been doing this DIY dosing since 2008. Anyway, this one is simple....2 cups of Prestone Driveway Melt to one gallon of RO/DI. That's it!

Happy dosing!

 

[ReefMadScientist]

HERE is Dr. Randy's formula write-up.


I'll simplify it:

ALK: 2 1/4 cups baking soda on a baking sheet cooked at 350 F (Randy says 300, but 350 works better and no negative impact) for one hour. Let cool and add to one gallon container and add RO/DI water to the one gallon mark. FYI, chemically, you are converting sodium bicarbonate to sodium carbonate. Here I have two batches ready to be baked:

CALC: I use Prestone Driveway Heat ice melt. Dow Flakes is very difficult to find and this Prestone product is very common in the northeast during the winter months. And FYI, I've been doing this DIY dosing since 2008. Anyway, this one is simple....2 cups of Prestone Driveway Melt to one gallon of RO/DI. That's it!

Happy dosing!

LOL! You are the Walter White of Reefing lol. Great job and thanks for the tip!!! My wife will see this in the oven and call the police.

 

[yellojello]

I follow BRS instructions for Alk and CA, but for Mag, I put in triple the amount of Magnesium Sulfate/Chloride per instructions in 1 gallon of water. I assume you can probably do the something similar with the others just as long as all of the powder dissipates into the mix. A stronger solution means less liquid dosed and a longer lasting gallon. YMMV. I may try doubling up Alk and Mag once my requirements increases.

 

[mcarroll]

I think you got some of this advice in your other thread too.....but I'd skip the baking on reef-oriented grounds in addition to the police-avoidance reasons aforementioned!

I think you're also seeing an association of equivalence between DIY two-part and products like Brightwell's.

They are similar. And they do function about the same. But they are not equivalent.

Road salt is vastly different in purity than what you'll find Brightwell or any of their competitors - including BRS - using in their products. Baking soda too. This is why Brightwell and any of the better products (again, including BRS) cost more than road salt!

Also, Brightwell tends to offer their alkalinity products as blends of baking and washing soda, as well as some borate salts. As a result, they tend to be a bit more neutral in impact to the tank. This may be useful to some people, but I've had the best luck with plain baking soda - it's (very) slight and temporary pH-lowering effect works against (or doesn't encourage) calcium precipitation during dosing.

So, are the DIY ingredients "good enough"? Based on my experience and others, they seem to be. (A good water change routine is pretty mandatory as a compliment, especially at higher dosage rates.) But, if I weren't as budget-limited as I am, I think I'd still be using a commercial calcium additive like Calcion-P along with baking soda. Probably a commercial Mg additive as well, but that's usually a very minor expense either way to you.

Hope this helps!

-Matt

 

[ReefMadScientist]

I think you got some of this advice in your other thread too.....but I'd skip the baking on reef-oriented grounds in addition to the police-avoidance reasons aforementioned!

I think you're also seeing an association of equivalence between DIY two-part and products like Brightwell's.

They are similar. And they do function about the same. But they are not equivalent.

Road salt is vastly different in purity than what you'll find Brightwell or any of their competitors - including BRS - using in their products. Baking soda too. This is why Brightwell and any of the better products (again, including BRS) cost more than road salt!

Also, Brightwell tends to offer their alkalinity products as blends of baking and washing soda, as well as some borate salts. As a result, they tend to be a bit more neutral in impact to the tank. This may be useful to some people, but I've had the best luck with plain baking soda - it's (very) slight and temporary pH-lowering effect works against (or doesn't encourage) calcium precipitation during dosing.

So, are the DIY ingredients "good enough"? Based on my experience and others, they seem to be. (A good water change routine is pretty mandatory as a compliment, especially at higher dosage rates.) But, if I weren't as budget-limited as I am, I think I'd still be using a commercial calcium additive like Calcion-P along with baking soda. Probably a commercial Mg additive as well, but that's usually a very minor expense either way to you.

Hope this helps!

-Matt

I am excited on this venture to fixing my problem. Thanks again!!!

 

[ReefMadScientist]

I follow BRS instructions for Alk and CA, but for Mag, I put in triple the amount of Magnesium Sulfate/Chloride per instructions in 1 gallon of water. I assume you can probably do the something similar with the others just as long as all of the powder dissipates into the mix. A stronger solution means less liquid dosed and a longer lasting gallon. YMMV. I may try doubling up Alk and Mag once my requirements increases.

Cool sounds good!

 

[redfishbluefish]

I follow BRS instructions for Alk and CA, but for Mag, I put in triple the amount of Magnesium Sulfate/Chloride per instructions in 1 gallon of water. I assume you can probably do the something similar with the others just as long as all of the powder dissipates into the mix. A stronger solution means less liquid dosed and a longer lasting gallon. YMMV. I may try doubling up Alk and Mag once my requirements increases.

Hold on one moment.....I can't comment on the solubility of calcium and magnesium compounds, but the alkalinity compounds are close to their saturation point. I know baking soda (sodium bicarbonate) will max out around 1 3/4 cups per gallon. With baked baking soda (sodium carbonate), it's a bit higher, maybe up into the 2 3/4 to 3 cup range.

I am surprised that you can get 3 times the amount of magnesium compounds into solution, assuming BRS formula is similar to Dr Randy's mix. With Dr Randy, the normal MAG solution is 3 cups magnesium sulfate and 5 cups of magnesium chloride. I would have guessed that you couldn't get 9 and 15 cups, respectively, dissolved into one gallon.

 

[mcarroll]

Hold on one moment.....I can't comment on the solubility of calcium and magnesium compounds, but the alkalinity compounds are close to their saturation point. I know baking soda (sodium bicarbonate) will max out around 1 3/4 cups per gallon. With baked baking soda (sodium carbonate), it's a bit higher, maybe up into the 2 3/4 to 3 cup range.

I am surprised that you can get 3 times the amount of magnesium compounds into solution, assuming BRS formula is similar to Dr Randy's mix. With Dr Randy, the normal MAG solution is 3 cups magnesium sulfate and 5 cups of magnesium chloride. I would have guessed that you couldn't get 9 and 15 cups, respectively, dissolved into one gallon.

+1

Giving him the benefit of the doubt, I'm glad an ultra-concentrated formula is working for him, but I would consider what he's doing an expert level move and would not recommend it to anyone in general...too many potential issues if you aren't prepared. Your dosing solutions being out of sync with the Reef Chemistry Calculator would be enough reason by itself for me not to do/recommend this. Too good of a resource when you're starting out (and still for me x years into my reef!).

Generally more-dilluted solutions are easier to deal with as they foul drip lines less-quickly, cause smaller chemistry changes, cause them more slowly, allow higher-resolution dosing, among other issues.

If you're going DIY (or "equivalent"), I ordinarily always recommend Recipe #2....and mix all three components according to the instructions.

FYI: Depending on how DIY your ingredients are, you may have to do a little tweaking for calcium to get the concentration right.....probably Mg too. Non-commercial reagents are likely to have varying ammounts of water within the product - more as time goes on since these salts are hygroscopic. (I have to mix my road-salt calcium 20% "stronger" by weight now than when I opened the bucket.) Baking soda doesn't really vary. Not the end of the world, but managing details like this is why some folks still use some DIY and some commercial reagents. For me, permanently switching to (not-baked) baking soda for alk reduced my dosing budget enough that commercial-grade Ca and Mg don't cost all that much on a yearly basis if/when I decide to use them. Currently, I'm only usin commercial-grade Mg. (Some BRS, some Brightwell.)

-Matt

 

[yellojello]

I'm not an expert and just wanted to offer what I have done. Just to clarify, the Alk and Ca is the BRS stuff and I am using at the normal instructed diluted rate. Haven't tried to do a stronger solution for those, but wondering it may be a possibility. Currently am dosing about 30ml per day of each with my lightly stocked 120g. Before, I was dosing nearly 150ml per day prior to my tank crash. (mixed reef).

The Magnesium Sulfate and Chloride I am using is not the BRS stuff, but from a LFS. The BRS instructions are 3 cups Sulfate and 5 cups Chloride. My LFS one instructs 0.28 cups of Sulfate and 0.62 cups of Chloride, which seemed weak for me as the gallon seemed to run out too fast. I called the LFS and he stated that you can probably double that, but I ended up calculating it to something easier to measure, which mine is 3.6 times the instructing, calling out for 1 cup of Sulfate to 2.25 cup Chloride. Sorry for the confusion, as tripling the BRS Magnesium would call for 24 cups of powder, which is why you are surprised as that would be insane to mix with 1 gallon or water. LOL

The BRS Soda Ash (Sodium Carbonate) calls for 2 cups, so I may try the 2.75 - 3 cup range in the future.

I didn't think about it, but it makes sense a denser solution may foul up the dosing lines. I'll look out for that, but hopefully the setting the dosing schedule every 2 hours or 12 times a day will help.

All in all, I don't really follow the calculator. Just start with small doses and check parameters every 2 to 3 days. Also, water changes will throw off the parameters (for me at least) since I cannot get the fresh saltwater mix to the exact tank parameters, so I have to adjust the dosing or testing accordingly. After a while, you know how much to mix of what. Just write everything down so you don't forget.

 

[mcarroll]

Keeping a test log is great advice - keep some general notes in it as well!

-Matt

 

[marke]

I don't know about you but if I tried to stick two big trays of chemical in my wife's oven, she would not be smiling? Spill some on the counter and floor and forget facial expressions now we get verbal abuse. Not worth it to save $2 a month.

 

[redfishbluefish]

Marke, the chemicals you are talking about are the same chemicals your wife uses to make those delicious chocolate chip cookies. It's baking soda...the chemical "yeast" to produce tiny gas bubbles in baked goods. Your wife uses it all the time in any and all baked goods. You're doing the same thing by blowing off the carbon dioxide to convert baking soda (sodium bicarbonate) to soda ash (sodium carbonate). If the wife still objects, buy your cookies at your local baker and your soda ash from BRS.